Craters After Skyfall
by ThisCatWhatDidThat
Summary: Two years since the final fall. Two long years, but now she was ready to take on the world.
1. Chapter 1 In which we begin

"I need a team."

The blue haired bar lady looked up, and was pleasantly surprised to see and old acquaintance of hers.

"Faolin!" She grinned, deftly leaning over the bar to give her a one sided hug. "Erinn will be so glad to see you hun. It`s been what, two years?"

"Twenty months, and twelve days." Came the curt reply. Patty sighed a little inside. The last time she had seen the girl, she was bedridden and had drawn back into her shell, retreating from the world.

"So," She grimly pushed on, fake smile plastered on her face. "You need a team. Three I take it?"

Nod.

"Lemme guess, Healer, Martial Artist, and Mage?"

Shake. "Thief, instead of Martial Artist."

"Really hun? Well, whatever floats your boat." Patty rummaged around the in the stacks of paper, before flourishing one. She handed it over the bar, to the sullen minstrel. "Ah ha! These guys have been hanging around for a bit now. Can't seem to hold a job without pissing off the client, so they've stuck around the inn. They're at table six. Good luck sugar!"

Faolin nodded her thanks, the made her way through the smoky bar room of the inn.

"Ace of clubs."

"Ha, is that the best you have? King of swords."

"Please, we all know who the better player is. Royal flush."

"What? But - How- eh?"

The poker match was interrupted by small leather pouch being dropped unceremoniously on the table with a dull clink. The sound of money. And when you are broke, it is a very good reason to stop and listen.

The first player looked up, squinting his grey eyes, at the taller figure

"May we help you?" he asked politely. She was the one with the money after all.

"You are Fanato, level 37 healer, Janscour, level 39 thief, and Jazca, level 37 mage?" was the stiff reply.

"So what if we are? We don't owe you money. Do we?" the thief turned to better address his companions, taking his feet of the table. The last time they had owed someone money it had ended with three of them being banned from the continent of Gleeba.

"I would guess, as you are offering money, and having just talked to Patty, you would be wanting to hire us, yes?" The voice had the barest hint of an accented, coming from the only female of the trio.

"Correct. You would fight with me as a party, and accompany me, no questions asked. You would get half of any profit from fighting monsters, and inn rooms would be paid for by me. Food, you would have to buy yourself, and the same stands for equipment. Do we have a deal?"

Several eyebrows were raised. This was a generous offer, one you did not see every day. For three down-on-their-luck adventures, it was not one they would see again.

"We'll take it."

"Good." The ghost of a smile flitted over the strange woman's face. "My name is Faolin. I'll meet you here, at 5 o'clock, tomorrow morning. Don't be late." With that, she turned around, and walked off through the tobacco smoke.

"Damn. What an attitude,"

"With that money, she can afford an attitude. Jazca?"

"Hmm?" The purpled hair mage cocked her head, feigning innocence.

"Well? You got into her mind, didn't you?"

"No. She has a surprising number of walls, and when I tried to push past them she showed me a memory of her killing a monster. It wasn't pretty."

"Do we wanna try to find out who she is, or just go with it?" Janscour asked, his feet, now coming back on the table.

"It wouldn't be unreasonable to know who our employer is..." Fanato mused.

"It was really yucky."

"We could maybe ask the inn owners,"

"Or just read their minds,"

"Reading minds would be easier. Can you take the strain?"

"Mmmm, maybe. Who would you suggest?"

Another thump interrupted their conversation. Three guilty heads looked up, at Patty, rather viciously attacking the table with a dishcloth.

"She employ ya then?"

"What if she did?"

Patty snorted. "I suppose you wanna know about her then, right?"

Fanato sighed, putting a placating hand on the tense Janscour. "We were that loud?"

"No. It's bleeding obvious sugar. Last three teams did, and got beaten within an inch of their lives. By her, not me." She hastily added, noticing the worried expressions.

"So, we've just been employed, by a psychopath then?"

Patty sighed again, and eased of attacking the table. "I honestly couldn't tell you hun, even if I wanted to. Look," She straightened up, putting her hands on her hips. "Come by when the crowd is smaller, and I'll tell you what I know." She turned around and sashayed off to the bar.

The celestrian stared at the sky

And stared

And stared

The sky was beautiful

So far

So far away from her

Her home

Maybe

If _it _worked

Maybe

The backroom of the bar was the place where the employees went between shifts, of get a drink (non-alcoholic) or just chat. It was unusually full this evening.

Patty sipped from a mug, whetting her throat. "I first met Faolin in the Hexagon-"

"I thought it was closed years ago!"

The blue haired bar lady glared at Fanato. "It was. Do you wanna hear the story?"

Fanato shut up.

"As I was saying, I met her about three years ago, in the Hexagon. Remember that earthquake that happened around the same time?"

"No, we were in the Bloomingdale area," Jazca said, gesturing to her companions. "Me and Fanato are cousins, and grew up there. Janscour is from a travelling tribe, yes?" A nod confirmed.

"Right, but you still got tremors from the aftershock?"

"Yes?"

"Well, our very own Angel Falls, just north-westish of here, got hit the hardest. The epicentre or, something. Well, according to Erinn, Faolin, fell of the top of the Angel Falls waterfall. Bullshit is what I think. I've tried it myself, and there is no way, any mortal could go through that, there is no way of physically doing it. Anyway, she apparently fell down, and got injured. Healed up, and sent a lot of time staring at those statues... ya know, the weird ones with the wings? To cut a long story short, after hearing about me travelling through the Hexagon, 'cos the road was blocked by rubble from the earthquake, and not turning up, due to being trapped, she went down, fought a load of monsters, days after recovering from that fall, and defeats the Hexagoon, the big evil beastie. Days later, we see her in Stornway, and she is offering to fight the Wight Knight! You should know what that is, and she won! After that, we didn't see her as much, mebbe once a month, but we, at the inn, heard talk, about a green haired slip of a girl, fighting huge monsters, and winning! At first I didn't believe it. One thing to fight the Hexagoon, but dragons the size of mountains!? I think not. If we at the bar asked her, she would not reply, just kinda...shut down. The last time I saw her, before today, she had turned up at the inn, covered in wounds and blood, and was half dead. She was..., there's no other way of putting it, broke. Wouldn't talk, wouldn't eat, wouldn't sleep. Just stared at the sky. One day she upped and left. Tried looking for her, but no tracking spells would work. Figured she would come back when she wanted something, although, seeing her again today," Patty sipped her drink again, thirsty from all her talking. "Was like seeing a ghost of how she used to be."

"Yeah, but where do we come in, in all this?" Janscour said. In his opinion, words were nice, but actions got things done.

"I'm guessing that you want to us find out more about this Faolin, right?" Fanato said head cocked slightly to the left. "What's in it for us?"

Patty spluttered into her tea. "Don't give me that," She managed to choke out. "I got you a job and information. You can repay me, by giving _me_ information. Savvy?"

The grumbled agreement sealed the deal.

**AN **

**Hello! Thanks for reading this. It's actually been kicking around on my computer for a while, so it's nice to finally post it. Please tell me what you think! On another note, I am British, and therefore will be using British English. EDIT: Spell checked, as well as grammar. Sorted out the line breaks. Hopefully.**


	2. Chapter 2 In which there is walking

They set off the next morning, tramping through the soggy forest that surrounded Stornway. Silence cloaked them as Faolin led them, with Fanato, Jazca and Janscour all trailing behind sleepily. They tramped, on and on and on, for what to Janscour, seemed like hours.

"Are we there yet?"

Grunt.

"What does that mean?"

Fanato decided to speak up at this point. "Where are we going exactly?"

Faolin stopped and spun around to face them. "Do you remember the part of the contract that said `No questions`?"

"…Yes."

"Exactly." She turned around again, and stomped off in the undergrowth.

~Linebreak~

The party continued walking throughout the day, stopping only as they came across a small settlement. It was nothing fancy, just a small cluster of houses that belonged to the community there. They managed to blag a stay in the barn, and rested until the morning. Jazca and Janscour fell asleep pretty quickly, what with the mage have, well, pretty awful stamina in Fanato's opinion, and Janscour's near-magical ability to fall asleep almost anywhere, at any time, in any position. Just before he himself fell asleep, he fancied he could see a strange shadow coming from near where the door let moonlight in. His logical mind dismissed it. A trick of the light. Or dark. He slowly drifted off musing to himself woud it be a trick of light or dark, completely forgetting that the shadow look like a pair of colossal wings.

~Linebreak~

AN

Sorry for the short chapter, I've moved house and currently I am sick. Which sucks. On another note, I hope to update more regularly. Also this story takes place in a slight AU. The world is a lot bigger, with more small settlements and the towns being bigger. Kinda like Skyrim.

Please review, and I will write include your OCs! (Shameless advertising is Shameless!)


	3. Chapter 3 In which we fight

They awoke in the dark next morning, and set off Faolin leading the way, Janscour and Fanato yawning in the middle, and Jazca trailing behind. It was foggy, with a light fine rain that persisted until noon. Jazca shivered and pulled her coat around her. She was soaked through, and if there was one thing the purple haired Mage hate it was the cold. Granted she lived in Stornway most of the time, that was notorious for its semi constant dampness which froze you to the bone. If she had any choice in the matter, she would've suggested that they all stay in the barn 'till the rain stopped. She thought sourly about her contractor and her seeming love for early mornings. These thoughts made everything better for a while, until suddenly Jazca felt another conscience brush her mind. It was primitive and boy was it angry. She froze desperately feeling for where it had come from.

"Janscour…" She said in a warning tone. He stopped and turned around to look at her, as did Fanato and Faolin. The mage had many times before saved their bacon by foreseeing surprise attacks by monsters.

"What is it?" Faolin asked brusquely.

"There is a monster nearby, I think it is going-"Jazca started, but never finished. For at that moment the monster did attack. It jumped out of the bushes, screeching blue murder. Janscour dodged backwards to in front of the mage, claws held defensively. Fanato pulled his shield up, and circled back, muttering a spell of healing, preparing for the worst.

Faolin did nothing.

The monster itself, Jazca recognized as a Bodkin Fletcher, only this one was massive, far, far bigger than usual, its robes torn and ragged with visibly weeping wounds on its skin. It screeched again, flailing its bow as a club. Janscour tried to take a swipe at it, but it knocked him away with a simple hit.

"Over here beast." Faolin's thin voice carried over to it. It stopped and turned around sniffing her scent. It then charged at her, bow held aloft. It went to smash it down on the green haired girl's skull, but it wasn't there. Quicker than Jazca could see Faolin had dodged away, and just as quickly delivered a swift upward blow with her sword. The Bodkin fell to the ground with a thump.

Dead.

Jazca felt its mind die and shuddered. Her employer was truly scary.

~Linebreak~

AN: You can thank Maneki Neko for this chapter. Her lovely review inspired me to write moar(And thanks for pointing out those issues, I never would have seen them by myself)! I'll try and post again sometime soon, but I might not. Tell me, do you like the shorter more frequent updates or longer, but further apart ones?


	4. Chapter 4 In Which We Wait And See

Faolin wiped the blood off her sword using the ragged tunic that the Bodkin had worn. Something was wrong. The creature's essence had felt corrupted, dirty and broken, like something had attacked it. The mortal mage could feel it too. She would have to watch out for her. Faolin knew she had strong mental defences, but the mage had shown a talent for burrowing into people's minds like a sneaky little worm, and if she got through,

'Well…' Faolin thought, standing up to sheath her sword 'I'd just have to kill her then.'

The party disposed of the body with a quick fire spell, not wanting to attract unwanted attention, and carried on walking. They weren't attacked by any more monsters, strange or not. As they got closer to their destination, slowly the landscape changed from lush, soggy green forest to flatter land with scrubby bushes that Ragged Reaper's had the nasty habit of hiding in. The trees grew sparse as they approached human inhabited farming land, and for the next hour or so they waded their way through neck high wheat fields, the sun high in the sky, beating down on their necks making the whole process thoroughly unpleasant. The party finally emerged to see the village of Zere, standing by the riverbank. They walked through the gates in silence.

Zere had changed little since Faolin had last seen it, the houses maybe a bit worn and the people a bit older but on the whole it was the same.

This made her angry.

How dare it, how dare they stay the same, going about their stupid mortal lives, if you can call such a short time a life she though angrily, glowering.

"Uh, boss lady?"

Janscour. She turned to address him, schooling her face to an emotionless façade.

"Yes?" She asked in a neutral tone.

"What exactly are we doing here?"

"You," Faolin said, pointing at the three of them. "Are staying here, out of trouble. Where I'm going is none of your business." She walked off, leaving the other three standing in the road.

"Ugh." Janscour groaned, dragging his square fingers through his hair in frustration. "She doesn't have to be such a bitc-"

"Janscour!" Fanato exclaimed. "Please don't insult our employers. At least not within ear shot."

xxx

The green haired minstrel knocked on the door of the small cottage. The door opened, and behind it stood the old woman she had been coming to see, Petra.

The old woman looked up at her, recognition dawning in her eyes.

"You're the lass tha' was saying about Mason building some massive great copy of Zere?" she asked, rolling her r's.

Faolin nodded. Petra stepped back from the door.

"Well, you'd best come in then lass."

xxx

The inside of the cottage hadn't changed either, Faolin noted as she sat at the table.

"Tea?" Petra asked, bustling about the kitchen.

"No thank you" Faolin said politely (Well, as politely as she was likely to get). The minstrel didn't like the sensation of eating and drinking, even now after spending years in the mortal realm, and being bound by the needs of her new body. It reminded her too much of being invaded. The feeling of something cold and wet slipping down her throat, ugh, she shuddered at the thought of it. She hadn't realised at first that she needed to eat and drink, and had ended up fainting on Ivor.

"So, what do you want lass? I'm sure it isn't to see little old me." Petra said, sinking into the chair across from Faolin.

"What do you know about Brigadoom?" The question was blunt, to the point. No use faffing about.

"Brigadoom? That old place?"

"Yes." She replied tersely.

"What d'you want to know?"

Faolin leaned forward. "Anything. Almost all records of it are gone, and Zere is the closest inhabited place. My team and I have been hired to exterminate some monsters" At the word monsters her lip curled up in disgust, "And we need to be prepared. So," The green haired woman leaned back. "What can you tell me?"

xxx

"Gah, she's been in the forever! How long's it gonna take?"

"Shut up Janscour."

"But seriously, all she does is dump us here, and then ponce off," He said, skipping in a crude imitation of Faolin. "For some Almighty forsaken reason!" Janscour moaned, coming to a standstill.

"She's already snapped at us, and we really don't want to lose this contract. At least I don't." Fanato sighed. They were sat by the road at the gate into Zere, and had been for the last hour of so. At first it hadn't been that bad. The sun was shining, but it started to get cloudy after a little while. Then it rained, joy of all joys. So here they were huddled on the roadside, like poor little lost, abandoned kittens.

Only not as cute.

Jazca was doing all she could to block out the boy's bickering by meditating. It wasn't working very well. She sighed. When was Faolin going to get back?

**AN: An update! Thanks to Manga Molly and Death Update for spurring me on! Want to see your OC? Send me their details via PM and I'll incorperate them in the story! **


End file.
